Former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who refuses to go away, talked about Springfield a bit when he spent a couple of hours Wednesday hosting a talk show on Chicago radio station WLS-AM.

Bernard Schoenburg

Former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who refuses to go away, talked about Springfield a bit when he spent a couple of hours Wednesday hosting a talk show on Chicago radio station WLS-AM.

For part of the time, he was talking with two actors from The Second City comedy troupe who perform in “Rod Blagojevich Superstar.” In the process, it was mentioned that the spoof of Blagojevich’s shenanigans played to sold-out houses last weekend in the capital city.

“They loved the show,” said one of the actors.

“Yeah, they hated me,” Blagojevich said.

“That’s a great town,” one of the actors added. “Have you been?”

This started Blagojevich off on one of his “I-am-the-vanquished-do-gooder” rants about his relationship with Springfield during his six years as governor — until he was impeached and tossed out of office in January.

“You know, when you take on a system and establishment, and they’ve got a big, powerful public employees’ union who (new Governor) Pat Quinn s pandering to ’cause he’s gonna raise taxes on working people to pay for needless waste in government that big union wants. … And then they (Springfieldians, I presume) were upset ’cause we chose to live in the (Chicago) neighborhood and raise our children.”

Blagojevich said his support went from 43 percent (in Sangamon County) in the 2002 gubernatorial election down to just under 21 percent when he was re-elected in 2006.

If you take the African-American community out of it, Blagojevich indicated, perhaps nine out of 10 whites in the Springfield area voted against him in 2006.

The union Blagojevich apparently was referring to is Council 31 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. Spokesman Anders Lindall responded later: “I’ve got three words for you — ‘Consider the source.’”

Because it’s hard to break a six-year-old habit, I decided to check on the factual basis of some of what Blagojevich said. I don’t have a perfect method, because while Springfield has one majority-minority ward on its city council map, I’m not sure of the exact percentage of blacks, whites and others who live there. But we can get a feel for things.

In 2006, all of Sangamon County gave more than 67 percent of the vote to Republican candidate Judy Baar Topinka. A hair under 21 percent (pun intended) voted for Blagojevich, and nearly 11 percent supported Green Party candidate Rich Whitney.

Blagojevich did do much better in Ward 2, which was drawn up to have a majority of black voters. There, he got about 60.3 percent of the vote to 31.4 percent for Topinka and 8.3 percent for Whitney.

Springfield Ward 2 Ald. Gail Simpson said she couldn’t speak for all of Ward 2, but as for herself, she voted for Blagojevich both in 2002 and 2006.

“I thought he was a good governor,” Simpson said. “I saw some good things that he did.”

She counted among them working — even if mostly unsuccessfully — to allow importation into Illinois of prescription drugs from other countries where prices are cheaper. Blagojevich defied the federal Food and Drug Administration, which didn’t allow such importation, in that effort.

“The premise was a good premise,” Simpson said.

She noted that Blagojevich’s arrest in December on federal charges, including his alleged attempts to sell President Barack Obama's former U.S. Senate seat, came long after the 2006 race.

“That would have been problematic for me,” Simpson said.

She works for the Department of Children and Family Services, but didn’t want to comment on how Blagojevich treated her state agency.

I saw “Superstar” on Saturday at The Hoogland Center for the Arts in Springfield — one of five sold-out shows over the weekend. The hour-long musical got lots of laughs, one notable point being when actress Lori McClain, playing former first lady Patti Blagojevich, succinctly called Springfield a raunchy name as she disabused her husband, played by Joey Bland, of the idea that the family would be moving to central Illinois from Chicago.

Yes, it’s a spoof, and there was plenty to laugh at. But what jumped out at me was the running joke about Patti Blagojevich’s use of vile language — based apparently on her allegedly coarse pronouncements caught on prosecutors’ recordings released to the public Dec. 9, when Blagojevich was arrested.

OK, Mrs. Blagojevich didn’t seem to smile much while in Springfield during her years as first lady, but the show is pretty rough on her. It would clearly be uncomfortable for her to be anywhere near the theater when people are cracking up at her supposed garbage mouth.

That is just one illustration of how ludicrous is the continuing nationwide Rod Blagojevich show. His renewed seeking of the limelight by being guest host on the “Don Wade & Roma Morning Show” on WLS on Wednesday flies in the face of normal behavior by somebody facing serious criminal charges. The charges made against him in December are expected to be replaced by grand jury indictments any time now. His public utterances could be used against him.

But it goes beyond a good sense of humor, I think, to promote a show that makes your wife look like a terrible person. The fact that Blagojevich said he hadn’t seen the show — in which he is referred to as a “delusional narcissist” — but would like to see it shows just how much his apparent need for attention trumps good sense.

He was asked, in jest, what part he’d like to play.

“I’d like to play the U.S. attorney, and I’d be real nice to the governor,” he said on the radio.

As expected by anyone who has watched the sad spectacle of Blagojevich since he was ousted from office, he used the airtime offered by WLS to twist the facts to blame others for his political demise.

He talked of being “hijacked” from office as part of a deal by legislative leaders and Quinn to get Quinn to raise the state income tax — something Blagojevich always said he wouldn’t do.

Of course, Blagojevich didn’t note the variety of scandals on the list that led to impeachment — from illegally ordering flu vaccine from overseas to allegations of pay-to-play politics to his circumvention of the General Assembly in expanding health programs to irregularities in state procurement. Those didn’t get the publicity of the more telegenic allegation that he wanted to sell Obama’s Senate seat.

Blagojevich also didn’t mention how he proposed the largest tax increase in state history — the doomed gross receipts tax — or how the state spiraled into deep debt under his watch. Those facts may not help sales of the book he is writing.

Quinn later Wednesday flatly dismissed the existence of a conspiracy to oust Blagojevich in order to pass an income tax.

“My view is, he’s yesterday’s tomatoes as far as the people of Illinois go,” Quinn said, using a now-favorite line. “He had his time. He disgraced himself. He disgraced our state. He can say whatever he wants on the radio. It’s a free country. But the fact is he was impeached by the House, removed by the Senate by a unanimous vote, to the great support of the people of Illinois.

“Everywhere I’ve gone in Illinois, there’s nothing but unmitigated joy that my predecessor is out of office, and that a new person, namely me, is in office as governor of our state,” Quinn told reporters in Springfield on Wednesday.

“Even people who may disagree with individual policies that I’ve espoused are very happy that I am governor and he is not.”

Quinn said anyone who has followed his career knows “I don’t do deals. Never have. Never will. I believe in the common good, public interest. That’s the way I conduct my private and public life.”

“My record stands for itself,” Quinn said. And he also said people would consider the source on the radio.

“Superstar” is running Thursdays through Sundays through May 3 at the Chicago Shakespeare Theater at Navy Pier. There are also four newly scheduled shows at the Hoogland Center in Springfield — at 7 and 9:30 p.m. May 16 and 2 and 5 p.m. May 17. Tickets for those Springfield shows go on sale at the Hoogland box office at 10 a.m. April 6. About 450 seats are available for each of those performances.

Bernard Schoenburg is political columnist for The State Journal-Register. He can be reached at (217) 788-1540 or bernard.schoenburg@sj-r.com.